Driving the Day

Good Saturday morning and Happy Lunar New Year. This NYT story is what D.C. is buzzing about this morning: “Refugees Detained at U.S. Airports, Prompting Legal Challenges to Trump’s Immigration Order.”

-- KEY SECTION: “The lawyers said that one of the Iraqis detained at Kennedy Airport, Hameed Khalid Darweesh, had worked on behalf of the U.S. government in Iraq for 10 years. The other, Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq Alshawi, was coming to the United States to join his wife, who had worked for a U.S. contractor, and young son, the lawyers said. They said both men were detained at the airport Friday night after arriving on separate flights. … ‘Who is the person we need to talk to?’ asked one of the lawyers, Mark Doss, supervising attorney at the International Refugee Assistance Project. ‘Mr. President,’ said a Customs and Border Protection agent, who declined to identify himself. ‘Call Mr. Trump.’” http://nyti.ms/2kdAb1o … Read President Trump’s executive orderhttp://nyti.ms/2kdFYnw

WE WILL SEE a lot of these stories in coming weeks. People who have fought alongside Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan want to come here, and will not be allowed to.

ALSO -- The Sept. 11 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt and Lebanon. Refugees from those countries are still allowed. Banned countries are: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen.

WHY ARE YOU SURPRISED? -- President Trump is doing exactly what he campaigned on.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP THIS MORNING -- @realDonaldTrump startingat 8:04 a.m.: “The failing @nytimes has been wrong about me from the very beginning. Said I would lose the primaries, then the general election. FAKE NEWS! … Thr [sic] coverage about me in the@nytimes and the @washingtonpost gas [sic] been so false and angry that the times actually apologized to its..... … ...dwindling subscribers and readers.They got me wrong right from the beginning and still have not changed course, and never will. DISHONEST”

-- BOTH NYT and WaPo say they have seen an increase in subscribers in recent months.

HAPPENING TODAY -- PRESIDENT TRUMP will speak to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Russian President Vladimir Putin, French President Francois Hollande and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. He’s signing executive orders in the afternoon.

-- FWIW: The Obama White House sent out a “week ahead” schedule on Fridays. The Trump White House did not do that yesterday.

THE JUICE…

-- PLAYBOOK EXCLUSIVE -- LAMAR TO PEYTON: I’M NOT GOING ANYWHERE YET -- We reported yesterday that there was rampant speculation Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) would retire, and Peyton Manning would run for his seat. Manning spoke at the GOP retreat in Philadelphia, and is attending the Alfalfa Dinner tonight as Sen. Bob Corker's (R-Tenn.) guest. He was also spotted last night hanging at Off The Record with Corker, Jim Baker and Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) -- see the spotted section below.

ALEXANDER'S CHIEF OF STAFF DAVID CLEARY sends Playbook a statement: “Like everybody else in Tennessee, Senator Alexander is a big fan of Peyton Manning. The senator has made no formal decision about 2020 but he’s fundraising and taking the steps one would take to prepare for re-election. Alexander had a 60 percent job approval rating in the latest Vanderbilt University poll and is busy as chairman of the Senate health and education committee repairing the damage caused by Obamacare and implementing the law fixing No Child Left Behind. He’s also focused on maintaining a Republican majority in 2018 and helping Senator Corker with his campaign in Tennessee.”

INSIDE 1600 PENN – NYT A1, “Trump’s First Week: Misfires, Crossed Wires, and a Satisfied Smile,” by Charlie Savage, Peter Baker and Maggie Haberman: “On the campaign trail, Mr. Trump boasted he had no government experience and, in his first week in the White House, it sometimes showed. Orders were signed without feedback from the agencies they would affect. Policy ideas were floated and then retracted within hours. Meetings and public events were scheduled and then canceled. Advisers to the president made decisions without telling one another. The president called for an investigation looking at voters registered in more than one state, unaware that it would include his chief strategist, press secretary, treasury secretary, daughter and son-in-law. And Congress often appeared to be an afterthought. ...

“In hopes of sharpening the process, Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s chief strategist, and Jared Kushner, his senior adviser and son-in-law, are forming what is being loosely called the Strategic Initiatives Group, a mini-think tank within the White House comprising analysts who can grapple with large-scale issues like cybersecurity. Such a group would have as many as a dozen strategists, and could help to centralize policy-making on some topics by Mr. Bannon and Mr. Kushner. Reince Priebus, the chief of staff, who knows Washington well and who works in conjunction with the two, is likely to run more of the day-to-day operations of the West Wing ... Mr. Kushner has emerged as the most important figure in Mr. Trump’s White House besides the president. He has told several people that all things on nearly every topic ‘run through me.’” http://nyti.ms/2k2T8Bw

A message from Blue Cross Blue Shield Association:

We believe everyone should have access to health care, no matter who you are or where you live. In every neighborhood in every state, Blue Cross and Blue Shield companies are working to improve health and expand access to quality care. Learn more at www.bcbsprogresshealth.com.

MICHAEL CROWLEY in Politico, “Trump’s making his own rules as a diplomat, too”: “Donald Trump made his own rules as a presidential candidate, and now he’s pushing ahead with global diplomacy in a similarly freewheeling fashion—with no Secretary of State yet in place and relatively little guidance from seasoned diplomatic advisers. Trump plans to speak by phone Saturday with the leaders of Australia, France, Germany and Japan, as well as with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The calls follow his White House meeting Friday with British Prime Minister Theresa May, and a phone call with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto. On Monday, Trump will host Jordan’s King Abdullah, a crucial Arab ally.

“The outreach comes despite the continued gaps in Trump’s diplomatic team. For decades, presidential meetings with foreign leaders have involved copious preparation by the State Department and the White House’s National Security Council which produces clear guidance to avoid surprises or misunderstandings that could trigger an international incident.” http://politi.co/2kdvwfU

--NYT A16, “Fears That Trump’s Visa Ban Betrays Friends and Bolsters Enemies,” by Declan Walsh: “Across the Muslim world, the refrain was resounding: President Trump’s freeze on refugee arrivals and visa requests from seven predominantly Muslim countries will have major diplomatic repercussions, worsen perceptions of Americans and offer a propaganda boost to the terrorist groups Mr. Trump says he is targeting. ... [I]n interviews with dozens of officials, analysts and ordinary citizens across Muslim-majority countries, there was overwhelming agreement that the order issued Friday signaled a provocation: a sign that the American president sees Islam itself as the problem. ‘I think this is going to alienate the whole Muslim world,’ said Mouwafak al-Rubaie, a lawmaker and former Iraqi national security adviser in Iraq.” http://nyti.ms/2kEjRrg

TOP TWEETS -- @AmbassadorRice: “This is nuts. Thousands of innocents who would enrich our nation now left to rot in camps/die in war zones across the world. #Solidarity” … Abed A. Ayoub (@aayoub): “Visas being denied immediately. Chaos at airports and in the air. #MuslimBan will apply to green card holders attempting to return tonight.” … @Ali_H_Soufan: “Since 2001, no major attack/plot in the US-including 9/11- was carried out by citizens of any of the 7 countries listed in the travel ban.”

MCCONNELL SPEAKS -- “McConnell warns Trump to back off on killing filibuster,” by Burgess Everett and Seung Min Kim: “After engineering a nearly year-long Supreme Court blockade, Mitch McConnell now wants Democrats to swallow President Donald Trump’s high court nominee hook, line and sinker. And a day after Trump urged McConnell to kill the filibuster if Democrats mount a sustained resistance to his high court pick, McConnell had this to say to the new president: That’s not your call.’ That’s not a presidential decision. That’s a Senate decision,’ McConnell told POLITICO in an interview Friday that focused mostly on the Supreme Court. ‘What I’ve said to him, and I’ve stated publicly and I’ll say today: We’re going to get this nominee confirmed.’ … Though McConnell has had a warm relationship with Trump, twice during the interview he subtly chided the new commander in chief. The Republican leader also implored Trump not to lift sanctions on Russia, a possibility that a top White House aide said Friday is under consideration.” http://politi.co/2jA2wyd

PLAYBOOK INTERVIEW: Speaker Paul Ryan

Speaker Paul Ryan sat down with us Friday afternoon for the first live Playbook Interview, sponsored by Uber. He spoke about all things 2017, what it’s like working with Donald Trump and how the GOP plans to deliver on their promises. “We are going to be big, and we are going to be bold, and we are going to go get it done,” Ryan told us. “Where we come out of this is unity. Unity among House and Senate Republicans and the White House.” Madeline Conway’s story: http://politi.co/2jgnseO … A video of the event http://cs.pn/2jA7g6V

OUR TOP HIGHLIGHTS:

-- PRAISE FOR TRUMP: “Well, I didn’t really know him before so I really have just more recently gotten to know him. I think I met him once for like 30 seconds in 2012, just shook his hand very briefly after he got the nomination for maybe an hour or so in Reince’s office during the campaign and then that was it. So we’ve gotten to know each other quite well the last few months. He is a sincere man. He’s a very smart, capable guy. He has a different style. We all know that. Just go on Twitter, you’ll see. He’s definitely going to be unconventional. But what I've enjoyed the last few weeks is he takes this very seriously. I think he realizes just the awesome responsibility. I think he understands how big a deal it is and what I love about it is that he is just convinced that he can be transformative and that he really wants to deliver. The guy never stops working. I mean, he has just endless energy.”

-- WON’T RESPOND TO TRUMP. While Ryan didn’t shy away from pushing back against Trump during the 2016 campaign, he’s clearly trying a new strategy post-election. When asked about everything from Trump’s position on torture to Steve Bannon’s comments to the New York Times that the press should “keep its mouth shut,” Ryan declined to comment. “I don’t care about distractions. We want to get results and get things done. We have big problems in this country but they are solvable problems and we think we’ve got very good solutions and we have to perform. The country needs it. Congress has not been working like it should have. We had a broken government. We now have an opportunity to fix it and I’m just excited about that and I’m not interested in getting pulled off into distractions which will take us from our goal and our job of solving problems for the people that just sent us into Congress, into the White House.”

-- GOP NEEDS TO DELIVER ON WALL -- BUT RYAN WON’T SAY WHY MEXICO SHOULD PAY FOR IT: “Well, look. I’m not going to take -- no offense, but I just don’t want to get into wedge -- I’m not going to take bait and drive wedges. I’m going to try and get things done, and I do believe that we should have a physical barrier at the border. Look, I voted for this in 2006, I think. We all did. Chuck Schumer voted for this in 2006. It never got done. This is why people are pretty upset. We say a lot of things up here, but we actually don’t do anything. This is what this Congress is about. It’s actually doing the things we said we would do—restoring the trust for the country. So, I’m not going to get into a quibbling about whether they should or should not pay for it. We got to get this thing done, because we said we would do it, and now we have to deliver.”

-- WARNING TRUMP ON RUSSIA SANCTIONS. “Yeah, I think the sanctions are overdue. I think Obama was late in putting them in place, so I think they should stay.”

AMAZING -- Someone leaked a tape of the GOP retreat to the Washington Post, New York Times, Guardian and other outlets. It lays bare some of the internal discussion in Philadelphia -- and also shows that the retreat is kind of a bland affair, with fault lines falling in familiar places.

-- “Behind closed doors, Republican lawmakers fret about how to repeal Obamacare,” by WaPo’s Mike DeBonis in Philadelphia: “Republican lawmakers aired sharp concerns about their party’s quick push to repeal the Affordable Care Act at a closed-door meeting Thursday, according to a recording of the session obtained by The Washington Post. The recording reveals a GOP that appears to be filled with doubts about how to make good on a long-standing promise to get rid of Obamacare without explicit guidance from President Trump or his administration. The thorny issues with which lawmakers grapple on the tape — including who may end up either losing coverage or paying more under a revamped system — highlight the financial and political challenges that flow from upending the current law.

“Senators and House members expressed a range of concerns about the task ahead: how to prepare a replacement plan that can be ready to launch at the time of repeal; how to avoid deep damage to the health insurance market; how to keep premiums affordable for middle-class families; even how to avoid the political consequences of defunding Planned Parenthood, the women’s health-care organization, as many Republicans hope to do with the repeal of the ACA.” http://wapo.st/2kxE7HN

WHAT REPUBLICANS ARE READING -- AP: “Americans Fear They’ll Lose Coverage With Obamacare Repeal: Poll”: “Though ‘Obamacare’ still divides Americans, a majority worry that many will lose coverage if the 2010 law is repealed in the nation's long-running political standoff over health care. A new poll by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that 56 percent of U.S. adults are ‘extremely’ or ‘very’ concerned that many will lose health insurance if the health overhaul is repealed. That includes more than 8 in 10 Democrats, nearly half of independents, and more than 1 in 5 Republicans. Another 45 percent of Republicans say they're ‘somewhat’ concerned.” http://nbcnews.to/2kEscvh

MIXED MESSAGES -- “Reversing course, Trump administration will continue Obamacare outreach,” by Rachana Pradhan and Paul Demko: “The Trump administration has reversed plans to scrap all Obamacare outreach in the finals days of the law’s enrollment period, a day after the move sparked outcry from the law’s supporters and health insurers. HHS officials on Friday said automatic phone calls and other online and digital outreach — including Twitter messages and emails — would continue through the Jan. 31 deadline for obtaining coverage. Officials also said they were unable to pull back some HealthCare.gov radio and TV advertising that had been purchased by the Obama administration. HHS was able to cancel about $4 million to $5 million in ads.” http://politi.co/2kxsQXV

FIRST IN PLAYBOOK -- THE NATIONAL PRESS CLUB has installed a protective security gate to fortify the club against intruders to the 13th floor of its downtown D.C. building. Club president Jeff Ballou tells us the gate was installed a few weeks ago as a part of “extensive security plan” to protect their members and is not related to the increased criticism of the media and harsh rhetoric against it. “We do not want folks running in and harming our members and guests.” Another Club source told Playbook that some people with no business being at the club recently had come up to the club from the elevators to take pictures of the lobby and members. Pic of the gate http://politi.co/2kEq46x

Playbook Reads

PHOTO DU JOUR: President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference with British Prime Minister Theresa May in the East Room of the White House on Jan. 27. | Evan Vucci/AP Photo

DANIEL BENJAMIN in POLITICO Magazine, “The Disastrous Consequences of Trump’s New Immigration Rules: With the stroke of a pen, the president has seriously jeopardized America’s safety and standing”: “[O]ver the past decade and a half, U.S. immigration enforcement has improved vastly to the point where it bears scant resemblance to the system whose vulnerabilities were exposed on 9/11. Travelers from all over the world are screened three or more times, with their names run through databases that draw on staggering amounts of intelligence and law enforcement information. The process flags all manner of misdeeds or suspicious information.” http://politi.co/2jg365k

THE SCATTERED OPPOSITION -- “DNC race: Low on energy, ideas, imagination,” by Isaac Dovere and Daniel Strauss: “The Democratic Party is in crisis, hollowed out at the state level, and desperate for new ideas, bold leaders and a cutting-edge plan of action against Donald Trump. The race for [DNC] chair is bland and bloodless. The seven candidates are downplaying differences and offering conventional ideas they all agree on. Go local. Pursue a new 50-state strategy. Something about cybersecurity. Organize. The list goes on, but the pitches share one thing in common: they’re not very complicated, imaginative or a break from the past. In part that’s a reflection of the seriousness of the Democratic predicament, both as a political party and in its official institutional apparatus. … But the nothingness and me-too-ism of the race is also a reflection of a crowded field that’s short on star power and heavy on party mechanics.” http://politi.co/2jHYeST

MEDIAWATCH -- POPPY MACDONALD emails POLITICO staff to announce “the creation of our new Audience Insights and Data team, established to ensure that we remain laser-focused on understanding what makes our influential readers, subscribers, and event-goers tick. … [T]his team will be dedicated to decoding shifts in consumers’ media habits, behaviors and motivations, allowing us to anticipate our influential audience’s needs before they do. … Rebecca Haller, who has most recently served as the Managing Director of research for POLITICO Focus, has signed on to lead this new department. Rebecca is uniquely positioned to run this independent, shared services group, having split her career on both the business and editorial sides of media at USA TODAY and Gannett.”

ALEX MARLOW PROFILE: “From Berkeley to Breitbart: He is the most consequential countercultural figure to come out of UC Berkeley since the Free Speech Movement. And he just helped get Donald Trump elected,” by Scott Lucas in the February issue of San Francisco Magazine: “Having recently assumed a position of almost unimaginable power in American journalism, Marlow could afford to smell the roses. Perhaps more than any other person working in media today, he has a direct line into the head of the 45th president of the United States. His most recent boss and constant adviser, Steve Bannon, stepped down as executive chairman of Breitbart in August to run Trump’s campaign and has been named senior counselor in the White House—one of the two or three closest advisers to the most powerful man on earth.” http://bit.ly/2kxf6fS

--NYT B4, “Megyn Kelly May Get NBC Morning Show, Shaking Up ‘Today,’” by John Koblin and Mike Grynbaum: “Ms. Kelly, who announced this month that she was leaving Fox News for NBC, will start at the network in May, and plans are beginning to take shape for her new show ... Ms. Kelly is being considered for a time slot at 9 or 10 a.m., for a show that is expected to begin in the fall. If she moves to 10 a.m., the popular fourth hour of ‘Today,’ hosted by Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb, will move to 9 a.m. One thing that is known for sure: The current iteration of the third hour of ‘Today,’ hosted by Tamron Hall and Al Roker, will be a thing of the past once Ms. Kelly’s show begins.” http://nyti.ms/2jHxvpH

-- Capri Cafaro is now a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. She is a former member of the Ohio State Senate, where she was the Senate minority leader. She is also an executive in Residence at American University’s School of Public Affairs. http://washex.am/2k1As52

--“Peter’s Choice: I asked my student why he voted for Trump. The answer was thoughtful, smart, and terrifying,” by Rick Perlstein in the Jan./Feb. issue of Mother Jones: “‘Imagine being one of those rednecks under the poverty line, living in a camper trailer on your grandpa’s land, eating about one full meal a day, yet being accused by Black Lives Matter that you are benefiting from white privilege and your life is somehow much better than theirs.’” http://bit.ly/2j8bLa4

--“Nobody Wanted to Take Us In: The Story of Jared Kushner’s Family, and Mine,” by Lizzy Ratner in The Nation: “As Trump prepares to ban refugees, it’s worth remembering the Jews who were shut out from our country the last time we closed our borders—like Jared Kushner’s grandmother.” http://bit.ly/2jGkNY3

--“Murderous Manila: On the Night Shift,” by James Fenton in the N.Y. Review of Books:“The targeted killings have their message for the world of the drug users and dealers. The crazy and seemingly haphazard extrajudicial killings, the corpses suffocated with packing tape and dumped at the side of the road with sadistic jokes on cardboard signs have a message for everyone: nobody is safe.” http://bit.ly/2jVgCZw

--“Naïveté is the New Realism,” by Justin Peters in Slate, reviewing “Thank You for Being Late: An Optimist’s Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations”: “Tom Friedman’s oracular pretensions have never felt more ridiculous than they do in his latest best-seller.” http://slate.me/2jiSX3g ... $16.80 on Amazonhttp://amzn.to/2jiY3MH (h/t ALDaily.com)

--“Fiction Confidential,” by Maria Bustillos in Eater – per Longreads.com’s description: “Before he became the patron saint of every tattooed-chef-in-a-gentrifying-neighborhood, Anthony Bourdain wrote novels. What can they tell us about the man behind the bad-boy persona?” http://bit.ly/2knCjBe

--“The Believers: Cult Murders in Mexico,” by Guy Garcia in the June 29, 1989 issue of Rolling Stone: “They thought their rituals of human sacrifice would make them invincible. In the end, a much stronger force prevailed.” http://rol.st/2k1woSu

--“The twilight of the liberal world order,” by Robert Kagan in Brookings: “With the election of Donald Trump … Americans have signaled their unwillingness to continue upholding the world order. This new approach in American foreign policy is likely to hasten a return to the instability and clashes of previous eras. History suggests that this is a downward spiral from which it will be difficult to recover absent a major conflict. The collapse of the world order, with all that entails, may not be far off.” http://brook.gs/2k1BmPg

--“The Untold Story of the Bastille Day Attacker,” by Scott Sayare in GQ: “Some in Nice knew the man as one of the many playboy predators the city seems to beget—black hair slicked back off a shining brow, dress shoes tapering to varnished points, a dark shirt unbuttoned low to reveal the pectorals into which he had obsessively, unblushingly, invested himself. He was 31 but preferred older women, both for their erotic openness and, it seems clear, for their money. Those who knew him best knew him to be a cold and brutal man, detached, amused by little save rough sex and gore.” http://bit.ly/2k4N9y3 (h/t Longform.org)

--“The Radical Crusade of Mike Pence,” by Stephen Rodrick in Rolling Stone: “He’s trampled on the rights of women, LGBTQ folks and the poor. Then there’s the incompetence. Meet, quite possibly, the next president.” http://rol.st/2kwY294

--“Can You Turn a Terrorist Back into a Citizen?” by Brendan I. Koerner in Wired: “A controversial new program aims to reform homegrown ISIS recruits back into normal young Americans.” http://bit.ly/2jiXC5f (h/t Longform.org)

--“How America Lost Its Identity,” by Holger Stark in Der Spiegel: “Over the last 30 years, conservatives and neoliberals have worked tirelessly to destroy the state, which they see as a form of imposed socialist administration. They have made America weak. In a complicated world where everything is connected to everything else, the protective identity of a state must experience a renaissance. Trump is one of the few conservatives to have recognized that fact.” http://bit.ly/2kwReIG (h/t TheBrowser.com)

--“The Atomic Origins of Climate Science,” by Jill Lepore in The New Yorker: “How arguments about nuclear weapons shaped the debate over global warming.” http://bit.ly/2j8lGMW

Playbookers

SPOTTED: Colin Powell, Jamie Dimon, Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), and Jeff Bezos all at separate tables at the downtown BLT last night ... Peyton Manning popping champagne at Off the Record at the Hay-Adams Friday night – he later had drinks with Sen. Bob Corker, Sen. John Thune and former Sec of State James Baker ... Sen. Tim Kaine at DCA on Thursday setting off the metal detector on his way to Miami – the harmonica in his bag did the trick ... Martin O’Malley, “very predictably” spending happy hour yesterday drinking a Guinness at Fado ... Bernie Sanders’ former campaign manager, Jeff Weaver, having lunch and a glass of wine at Union Pub yesterday ... Jeb Bush at DCA waiting for a flight to Miami.

Follow Us

About The Author : Jake Sherman

Jake Sherman is a senior writer for POLITICO and co-author of POLITICO’s Playbook, the nation's leading political newsletter. He is also the co-author of New York Times and national best seller, "The Hill to Die On: The Battle for Congress and the Future of Trump's America," which was published by Crown in 2019. Jake is an NBC and MSNBC political contributor.

Since 2009, Jake has chronicled all of the major legislative battles on Capitol Hill, and has also traveled the country to cover the battle for control of Congress.

Jake is a Connecticut native, and a graduate of The George Washington University — where he edited The GW Hatchet — and Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism. Jake lives in Washington with his wife Irene and his son, and listens to an unhealthy amount of Grateful Dead and Phish.

About The Author : Anna Palmer

Anna Palmer is a senior Washington correspondent for POLITICO and co-author of POLITICO’s Playbook, the most indispensable morning newsletter for the biggest influencers in politics. Anna covers the world of Congress and politics, and has successfully chronicled the business of Washington insiders for years. Her stories take readers behind the scenes for the biggest fights in Washington as well as the 2016 election.

She is also the co-author of New York Times and national best seller, "The Hill to Die On: The Battle for Congress and the Future of Trump's America," which was published by Crown in 2019.

In addition to Playbook, Anna is also editorial director of Women Rule, a POLITICO platform that is dedicated to expanding leadership opportunities for women at all stages of their career.

Prior to becoming POLITICO’s senior Washington correspondent, she was the co-author of the daily newsletter, POLITICO Influence, considered a must-read on K Street. Anna previously covered House leadership and lobbying as a staff writer for Roll Call. She got her start in Washington journalism as a lobbying business reporter for the industry newsletter Influence. She has also worked at Legal Times, where she covered the intersection of money and politics for the legal and lobbying industry, first as a staff writer and then as an editor.

A native of North Dakota, Anna is a graduate of St. Olaf College, where she was executive editor of the weekly campus newspaper, the Manitou Messenger. She lives in Washington, D.C.

About The Author : Daniel Lippman

Daniel Lippman is a reporter for POLITICO and a co-author of POLITICO's Playbook, the most indispensable morning newsletter for the biggest influencers in politics.

Before joining POLITICO, he was a fellow covering environmental news for E&E Publishing and a reporter for The Wall Street Journal in New York. He has also interned for McClatchy Newspapers and Reuters. During a stint freelancing in 2013, he traveled to the Turkish-Syrian border to cover the impact of the Syrian civil war for The Huffington Post and CNN.com.

He graduated from The Hotchkiss School in 2008 and from The George Washington University in 2012. Daniel hails from the Berkshires in western Massachusetts and enjoys playing tennis, seeing movies and trying out new restaurants in his free time.